The One That Got Away
by Bethan W.xo
Summary: They dated back when Rachel was 18 but he left for a recording contract in LA, what happen's when they are reunited at Quinn's wedding? It's not all accurate so don't judge on that but please R&R! :D


_Hey People!_

_I was inspired by Katy Perry's The One That Got Away in this story._

_This is my first try at a Glee Fanfiction, so go easy on me haha :) But I do know that the ending sucks so..._

_Hope you enjoy it and can you please drop a review?_

_Love Beth xx_

* * *

><p>"And now for the first dance…" Rachel, twenty seven years of age, heard the lead singer in from the band call in the background as she sipped on her champagne.<p>

She watched as her close friend Quinn stepped onto the dance floor holding onto her new husband's hand, Finn looked longingly into his wife's eyes as _Something About The Way You Look Tonight _by Elton John was being played and began to sway with her.

"They're adorable, aren't they?" Tina said quietly, Rachel nodded happily to her best friend.

"Where's Artie?" Rachel asked when Tina sat down in front of her.

"The guitarist is on a break, so I think he's talking to him. You know, he's kind of cute you should go talk to him." Tina winked and pointed to the man who was talking to her husband.

Rachel wasn't going to deny the guy was cute from the back and she couldn't help but think she knows him from somewhere. "Quinn told me he's an old friend of Artie and Finn's."

"Yeah, he's a little mysterious but if I wasn't married I'd totally have my way with him, c'mon." She grabbed Rachel's hand and drags her towards the two men. "Hey sweetie," Tina kissed Artie.

"Hey babe," The man in the wheelchair greeted, "Hi Rachel, I haven't seen you since the ceremony this morning." The man Artie was talking to finally turned around and Rachel's breath got stuck in her throat.

"Berry?" He called quietly and scratched the back of his neck, something he did when he was guilty or nervous.

Rachel's eyes welled up almost immediately as she heard the old nickname, "Noah." She choked before running off outside without looking back.

_No, no, no…This cannot be happening! Why did he have to show up? _She thought as she leaned on the wall letting the cold air run up her limbs and scratch at her face.

"Rach! What the hell was that? What's the matter?" Tina asked concerned. "Are you okay?" She noticed the tears running down Rachel's face.

"It's him, the guy I told you about." Tina's eyes widened, "The one that got away!"

**Ten years before…**

It was the summer after high school when she first met twenty year old, Noah 'Puck' Puckerman, she had just left her hometown and parents and moved to New York City to study music and he was the guy working at her local coffee shop a block away from her dingy apartment. Rachel was always a loud, outgoing person but there was something about this man that made her nervous, so nervous that she almost spilled her coffee on her white pristine Chanel scarf when he passed her the beverage with his number attached to it. They hit it off right away, and soon enough she was spending her Friday nights making out with him in his 1968 cherry red Mustang while their favourite Radiohead song played on the radio in the background.

"Berry…Berry wake up." He whispered in her ear early one morning, he began kissing down her neck and biting down gently at the junction of her neck and shoulder. He listened to her moan before talking again this time hovering over her pink lips, "happy birthday baby."

Her eyes fluttered open and she smiled brightly, "Noah, thank you, this is a lovely way to start the day but can you please just kiss me already?" She bucked her hips into his and he groaned lowly before slanting his lips over hers and rolled over so that she was straddling him.

A few hours later, after they had _cuddled _and ate their breakfast in bed, they were off to the tattoo parlour for Rachel's birthday wish, "You ready babe?" Puck asked and held her hand affectionately as she lay on the old green bench, wincing when she heard the tattooed man slap on his latex gloves.

"I can do this." She smiled nervously and kissed him. "Your needles are clean right?" She questioned him sharply, staring at the tattoo gun in his hand.

"Of course they are, little lady." Buck, the artist chuckled. "Can you just unbutton your pants and lower them a little? So I can clean the area."

She complied and let him place the outline transfer of her tattoo underneath the waistband of her panties, near her most private area, she lay there as calm as she could be and flinched only slightly when she felt the tattoo gun prick her skin. Thirty-five minutes later her tattoo was done and Puck proudly kissed her on the head, "S'fucking hot baby, totally badass."

"Get a picture for me? I told Santana I'd send her a picture." Rachel beamed and handed him her iPhone, he captured the picture of 'Noah' written in cursive with a small red plectrum next to it, "Aw, it's so cute!"

"Now we both have them." He grinned, and she laughed remembering last week when he got 'Berry' and a gold star tattooed on his ass.

"I still can't believe you did that!" She giggled, they were watching an old movie on her couch joking around, he had her pinned on the seat tickling her sides telling her to take it back after she said he wouldn't be badass enough to get her name tattooed on his butt, next day they were at the tattoo parlour and he was screaming like a little girl from the pain.

"You shouldn't have questioned my badassness then, babe." He told her as they walked out of the parlour and to his car.

"Noah stop it, you know I hate it when you call me _babe._ It's awful and demeaning."

"I'm sorry, beautiful. It won't happen again." He grinned at her, once they were sitting in his car.

"I forgive you," She giggled, "who can stay mad at that face?" Noah was looking at her with a big dorky look on his face, he pouted his lips at her and she kissed him lightly.

…

Rachel was hurrying around her apartment, picking up cups and magazines. She heard the buzz coming from the phone near the door; she picked it up and heard her boyfriend say, "Buzz me in baby."

"And to what do I owe the honour of your presence Noah?" Rachel smiled when he walked in carrying a grocery bag in one hand and his car keys in the other.

"Well, my parents are having a dinner with friends tonight and basically kicked me out, so I thought I'd steal their liquor and come to see my beautiful Berry." He kissed her cheek when he caught up to her in the kitchen.

"Santana is going to be home tonight to study so maybe we should go somewhere else, she's in that bitchy mood so I'd like to stay out of her way."

"The roof?" He asked her, and she sighed with a nod.

The roof was their special little hide out you could call it, a place where they could stare at Brooklyn, "So I'm thinking about selling the Mustang." He said once they were sitting on the edge of her building.

Rachel gasped, "Why?"

"Have you ever tried to drive around Manhattan at rush hour?"

She giggled, "I guess, I'll miss it though." Rachel took a swig of the Jack he brought with him, "We've had a _lot _of good times in the car."

"You're telling me." He chuckled, "so College starts up again soon."

"Yeah. Hey, it's your senior year and you've never even told me what you want to do after you graduate."

"Honestly? I have no clue, wait for a miracle to happen in the music biz and stay in New York until my girl has graduated and then start our own lives together."

"Really?" She choked out, her eyes welling up.

"Of course," he wiped a stray tear from her cheek, "I love you, Berry. I know it's quick and we haven't known each other that long, but there's something about you that drew me in and captured my heart."

"Oh Noah." Rachel placed her hands to her chest and smiled showing her pearly whites.

"Don't, I already sound like I've got a vagina." He chuckled, taking a drink.

"Well I think that's the most badass thing you've ever done." She whispered, "I love you too."

They stood up and looked over the city, you could see the Brooklyn Bridge clearly, all light up and looking pretty, Noah turned her towards him and slanted his lips over hers, wrapping his arms around her waist and hers around his neck. It was a Kodak moment, absolutely stunning.

"So I'm not getting out of this now am I?" She giggled.

"Not if I can help it." He winked. Little did she know, she would be losing him very soon.

**The Wedding**

Quinn pulled her inside and dragged her on stage, practically begging her to sing Rachel's first song that hit the Billboard 100. The bridesmaid looked at the band before she started the song and sighed seeing Puck tuning his guitar to the song, "Fine."

She was nervous throughout the first verse of her song, occasionally looking back at Puck seeing his Adam 's apple bob to the top of his throat and his green eyes looking guilty.

By the time she got to the chorus, she blocked him out and focused on the microphone in front of her.

_And in another life I would be your girl_

_We keep all our promises, be us against the world_

_And in another life I would make you stay_

_So I don't have to say you were the one that got away_

_The one that got away_

**Ten years before…**

It was the hottest day of the year and Noah and Rachel took a day trip to New Jersey with their friends to soak up the sun. "So June, do you want a drink?" Santana asked her friend.

"Who's June?" Rachel questioned her eyebrows knitting together in confusion.

"You obviously, and Puck is Johnny Cash."

"To be honest Satan, I'm surprised you knew who Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash was."

"Were Noah, it's were not was." Rachel corrected him, patting his cheek lightly.

"Aw, you guys are just adorable." Santana squealed, "So Puck, go make yourself useful and go get us something to drink." She ordered, placing her oversized sunglasses over her eyes and lay back on her towel.

"Fine, water?" He asked Rachel and she replied with a nod, "I'll be back in a minute." He kissed her quickly before jumping up with his friend Matt and walked to the shack where they sold burgers and drinks.

"I love you guys you know that?" Santana confessed to Rachel, "It's like you have an unwritten pact that you are never one without the other, you two just get each other, it's like a fairy tale."

Rachel looked over at the shack and watched her boyfriend laugh at something Matt said, he looked over at her briefly

…

She sat crossed legged in her panties and his t-shirt, bawling her eyes out. It had been two weeks since he left her, left her for a recording contract in LA. She turned on her radio and listened to the mix tapes he made her, some of his own songs and some covers that they listened to together, she missed him dearly. Rachel spent her days eating Hershey's and crying in bed. It got worse when Santana told her that Brittany had spotted Noah at a bar in California, talking to a friend about a tattoo removal, and she saw him again busking on downtown LA singing the blues. There was once a time when every song he wrote was about his love for her, or what he thought of his _beautiful Berry _but now she was no longer his muse, but clubs, strippers and drinking were the typical Noah Puckerman songs playing on an unknown rock station he introduced her to when they first got together.

**The Wedding…**

_But in another life I would be your girl_

_We keep all our promises, be us against the world_

_And in another life, I would make you stay_

_So I don't have to say you were the one that got away_

_The one that got away_

_The one, the one, the one_

_The one that got away_

She took a deep breath and squeezed her eyes shut to stop any tears from spilling,

_All this money can't buy me a time machine, no_

_Can't replace you with a million rings, no_

_I should've told you what you meant to be, whoa_

'_Cause now I pay the price_

_In another like I would be your girl_

_We keep all our promises, be us against the world_

_And in another life, I would make you stay_

_So I don't have to say you were the one that got away_

_The one that got away_

_The one, the one, the one, the one_

_And in another life I would make you stay_

_So I don't have to say you were the one that got away_

_The one that got away_

When she finished the song everyone was up on their feet, clapping and cheering for her, she tried to smile before running off stage and outside again. "I'm sorry." She heard a voice say.

Her head whipped around to see the person she wrote that song about, "What?"

"I said I'm sorry, leaving will always be my biggest regret." Noah told her, standing against the wall with her.

"Is it? You got to live your dream."

"No, I got to live what I thought was my dream for all of five minutes, when really it was and still is you that's my dream."

"Why did it take you so long to tell me?" She whispered.

"I couldn't face you knowing that you hated me, it broke my heart when Santana told me about you crying yourself to sleep every night."

"I never hated you Noah, I just hated that you left me when we promised we'd always be together." She confessed to him, shivering slightly and rubbing her arms to keep warm.

Noah shrugged off his leather jacket and placed it around her shoulders, "I didn't want things to end between us, I was going to ask you to come with me when I knew everything was secure and I knew we would be fine in LA, but we broke up before I even had a chance to ask."

Rachel turned her head and looked him dead in the eye, searching for any dishonesty but all she saw was the pure green eyes that she could see right through to his soul, "Oh Noah." She whispered, drawing the jacket further around her minute body.

"Berry, I understand if you don't forgive me for leaving but I just want you to know that I love you, and I've missed you so much."

"I haven't had a boyfriend since you, no-one could compare to you." Rachel told him, "I know I still love you, but I want us to work on getting back to where we were."

"As long as I can do one thing." He requested.

"And what's that? " She was cut off by his lips over hers. When Noah pulled back she smiled at him, "You should consider yourself lucky that I was always so easily forgiving with you."

"I consider myself lucky just to have you," He whispered, "I think my vagina is growing back."

"Way to ruin a moment Noah," She laughed throwing her head back, "but I'm not letting you getting away again, you know that?"

"I love you." He told her, "So how about Johnny and June make a comeback?"


End file.
